Can Luas card now be used on buses?

JuliusCaesar

Just wondering if I can use it on buses?

Or can I transfer the balance of 20-odd quid over to a Leap card?

Although seeing my busfare is mostly 1.20, I'm certainly not paying a default fare of 2.20!

stiofanD

JuliusCaesar wrote: »

Just wondering if I can use it on buses?

Or can I transfer the balance of 20-odd quid over to a Leap card?

Although seeing my busfare is mostly 1.20, I'm certainly not paying a default fare of 2.20!

No, you can't use it on buses, but you can request a 'free' leap card on their website if you have a luas smart card already. Then you just run down the credit on the luas card and once its at or below zero, switch over to the leap card.

gowens999

you mean there is no way to transfer the balance as is. You have to 'run it down' to zero? That's ridiculous.

Tarabuses

gowens999 wrote: »

you mean there is no way to transfer the balance as is. You have to 'run it down' to zero? That's ridiculous.

You can apply for a refund of the balance on your Luas card.

robd

gowens999 wrote: »

you mean there is no way to transfer the balance as is. You have to 'run it down' to zero? That's ridiculous.

It's way down the every growing list of ridiculous things about the new Leapcard. It takes twice as long to pay than by cash cause of slow system interacting with driver being at the top.

I tested it and have spent along time defending it's limitations on here. However, I'm running out of enthusiasm for continuing at that.

It doesn't exactly delight as a system.

Mark200

gowens999 wrote: »

you mean there is no way to transfer the balance as is. You have to 'run it down' to zero? That's ridiculous.

I don't think it's all that ridiculous. When you put the money on you surely knew it was for the Luas?

markpb

gowens999 wrote: »

you mean there is no way to transfer the balance as is. You have to 'run it down' to zero? That's ridiculous.

It's not really ridiculous. You bought a Luas card, you topped it up with Luas credit and now you're complaining that you have to spend it making Luas trips? The cards say that they may be swapped for a new ticket in the future (this is true, you can claim a free Leap card) but they do not say anything else.

Yes it would be nice if the balance could be transferred but making it happen is quite complicated (new card posted out, old card blocked, balance transferred, new card unlocked, what happens if the new card is late arriving, what day does it happen, what happens if it happens and you have the old card with you, etc, etc). Then you have the accounting side of it - the €20 you paid to Luas can now be spent on bus or train trips which would require RPA to pay Dublin Bus or Irish Rail for each of your journeys.

AlekSmart

markpb wrote: »

Then you have the accounting side of it - the €20 you paid to Luas can now be spent on bus or train trips which would require RPA to pay Dublin Bus or Irish Rail for each of your journeys.

Aha !!

Well done Markpb...as concise a description of an INTEGRATED Public Transport System as we are ever likely to get !!

Not quite what we have at the moment though..????

gowens999

Have to agree with AlekSmart here, not exactly 'integrated' is it? I have a Luas smart card and a Rail smart card and will have to separately get them changed over.

Why the integrated system wasn't rolled out from the start is beyond me. It did not make sense to let Dublin Bus, Irish Rail and LUAS make their own SMART systems, and then try develop a smart system around the three of them. They could have copied and pasted the already successful Oyster system from the UK, no need to reinvent the wheel.

It's taken TEN YEARS to get this developed. I wonder how much it cost us...

http://www.rpa.ie/en/its/Pages/ITSProgress.aspx
"In March 2002 S.I. No.84 tasked RPA with providing an integrated ticketing scheme. "

starviewadams

Somewhere in the region of €55 million I believe.

robd

gowens999 wrote: »

Have to agree with AlekSmart here, not exactly 'integrated' is it? I have a Luas smart card and a Rail smart card and will have to separately get them changed over.

Why the integrated system wasn't rolled out from the start is beyond me. It did not make sense to let Dublin Bus, Irish Rail and LUAS make their own SMART systems, and then try develop a smart system around the three of them. They could have copied and pasted the already successful Oyster system from the UK, no need to reinvent the wheel.

It's taken TEN YEARS to get this developed. I wonder how much it cost us...

http://www.rpa.ie/en/its/Pages/ITSProgress.aspx
"In March 2002 S.I. No.84 tasked RPA with providing an integrated ticketing scheme. "

In fareness it was more like 9 years tooling around developing logos, going on junkets around the world to trial other smart card systems, then implementing their own and binning it.

Then 1 year to implement an off the shelf solution which is a copy of oyster card.

Will take at least another 1 year to get functionality up to decent useable level.

Stark

robd wrote: »

Then 1 year to implement an off the shelf solution which is a copy of oyster card.

One wishes. Oyster is actually a decent system. The main selling point for me being that it automatically caps your spend based on the available ticket offers (annual, monthly, travel 90, rambler, whatever). The user never has to fumble about with the different options. At present, you still have to carry around miscellaneous tickets in addition to your Leap card if you want to avail of discounts. They promise in the future (hopefully not in another 9 years time) that you'll be able to load these tickets onto your Leap card but my fear is this will involve users having to tell the driver (I'd like to use the Travel 90 that's on the card please) further slowing the process of boarding.

robd

Stark wrote: »

One wishes. Oyster is actually a decent system. The main selling point for me being that it automatically caps your spend based on the available ticket offers (annual, monthly, travel 90, rambler, whatever). The user never has to fumble about with the different options. At present, you still have to carry around miscellaneous tickets in addition to your Leap card if you want to avail of discounts. They promise in the future (hopefully not in another 9 years time) that you'll be able to load these tickets onto your Leap card but my fear is this will involve users having to tell the driver (I'd like to use the Travel 90 that's on the card please) further slowing the process of boarding.

Oyster started out in limited form also with extra features such as capping etc. introduced on a phased basis.

God knows in regard to Dublin Bus. It's so poor. Wouldn't think so though, as it's easily programmable into system.

steve-o

Mark200 wrote: »

I don't think it's all that ridiculous. When you put the money on you surely knew it was for the Luas?

But now Luas are terminating their SmartCard, possibly within 3 months (and many occasional users will have credit beyond 3 months use). If there's no way to transfer a balance to Leap then Luas might find that they have to issue a lot of cheques.

L1011

robd wrote: »

Oyster started out in limited form also with extra features such as capping etc. introduced on a phased basis.

It did that when the technology was new and innovative. Leap is probably the 50th or so system of its kind to be introduced, not the second or third as Oyster was.

LXFlyer

That may be so but bringing anything like this on-stream in phases is far safer than one big bang.

Less to go wrong!

L1011

lxflyer wrote: »

That may be so but bringing anything like this on-stream in phases is far safer than one big bang.

Less to go wrong!

I've found that unless there's a rollout plan set in stone before you start that, your further stages may not happen.

markpb

MYOB wrote: »

I've found that unless there's a rollout plan set in stone before you start that, your further stages may not happen.

What makes you think there isn't one?

L1011

markpb wrote: »

What makes you think there isn't one?

If there is, its quite clearly not set in stone due to the repeated delays in getting the original cards out.

Carawaystick

markpb wrote: »

What makes you think there isn't one?

Either show me the stone it's set in or there isbn't one.

There shureAsHell isn't no integrated ticketing system.

The RPA were the main instigators of the integrated ticketing system. Tim Gaston worked for them, back then. I've emails from him @rpa.ie lest mods get defamation worries. Gowen also pointed out its originally a rpa show.

They now can't transfer credit from the tram smartcard to the integrated ticketing system contactless smartcard.

I wonder how much of the fifty odd million is for pension provision for these genii.

AlekSmart

Carawaystick wrote: »

Either show me the stone it's set in or there isbn't one.

There shureAsHell isn't no integrated ticketing system.

The RPA were the main instigators of the integrated ticketing system. Tim Gaston worked for them, back then. I've emails from him @rpa.ie lest mods get defamation worries. Gowen also pointed out its originally a rpa show.

They now can't transfer credit from the tram smartcard to the integrated ticketing system contactless smartcard.

I wonder how much of the fifty odd million is for pension provision for these genii.

Steady now Carawaystick...or Mrs Carawaystick will be bringing food parcels to you in Cloverhill......there's some very Bullseye stuff here alright !!!